Attempt in making bread pretty

I’m a n00b baker ATM, so wanted to see how easy or hard it is to make breads look pretty. It’s harder than it looks but definitely doable.

What’s the secret?

Ingredients

1 loaf

1. 400 grams of flour
2. 300 grams of water
3. 15-20 grams of salt
4. Sesame seeds
5. Active dry yeast
6. Oil

Recipe

15 min prep; 1.5 hour yeast incubation time; 45 minutes baking time

1. Heat water until it’s luke warm (~120F)
2. Add 2 Tbsp of active dry yeast and a pinch of sugar, and let it sit until the yeast activates (takes ~5-10 minutes)
3. Once activated, mix all the ingredients and knead it until the dough becomes soft. If you find the dough to be sticky, add more oil and continue kneading.
4. Let it sit for about 45 minutes.
5. The dough should have risen by now. Punch the air out of the dough and make it compact once again.
6. Try to infuse some air bubbles into the bread by folding the sides into itself
7. Let it sit in a lame (before doing this, coat the lame with rice flout so that the dough doesn’t stick to the sides) for about 45 mintues. Prehead the over in the meantime to 425F.
8. Dump the dough onto a silicon mat, score the dough and bake for about 45-50 minutes.

Here are some additional bread making attempts in 2020, with a similar recipe and different scores -